As it turns out, as a childbearer, I am an utter failure. being allergic to latex and having my asthma react to the hormones of pregnancy were not a good mix with pregnancy and a Cesarean birth. still I begged Max for another child. since the doctors had left Connor's birth with the advice "never let her get pregnant again" (based on the assessment that I had almost died from anaphalaxis in the surgery), Max would not waiver from his position. NO more pregnancies, not then, not ever!
I tried in vain to move him from the position. after all, I now knew that I was allergic to Latex and there were alternatives. I sought out a 2nd and even 3rd opinions from some of the foremost obstetricians in our area. The all were of the opinion that knowing what we knew now, it would not be a problem to me to carry another child, and since CP was a random disability, not connected to anything that we could tell, the chances were slim that we would have another disabled child. However, Max would not budge; not one centimetre. I begged, I cried, I pleaded. I even considered just stopping birth control and not telling him, but I could not bring myself to be that devious.
In the end we came to a compromise. Max said that I could adopt as many kids or puppies as I wanted to (we also had 2 dogs at the time) but he was not going to risk my life with another pregnancy. I suppose that at the time, I should have realised that this should how much he truly loved me, not wanting to lose me for anything, but all I could hear at the time were my ovaries screaming and my uterus aching.
So adoption it was. by the time we came to this agreement Connor was in grade 8 and looking at high school so it seemed like a good time to explore our options. Initially, we thought about foster care. there were so many kids with disabilities that we knew of in foster care that we thought this might be the best use of our resources. After researching it we knew it was not for us, as a friend of mine pointed out "do you think you could give them back?" I knew that I never could. I also did not think that neither Max or myself would be able to keep our mouths shut if the birth parents were doing things that we did not agree upon.
So we moved on to the adoption option. Several of the physicians that I worked with at the time offered to refer us to the next birth mother that was looking for parents. while a newborn appealed to me, we did not think it was fair to take that experience away from someone who had never had a baby. Besides, we had all the orthopaedic equipment, knew all the ins and outs, we thought that our resources would be best used in the adoption of another special needs child. after all, we also were aware that they were the hardest to find homes for and we seemed to be pretty good at it based on the kids we had!
I must say that the pre-adoption process was rigorous and fascinating. because we were doing a public not private adoption, we went to a series of classes with the children's aid society. every week for 6 weeks we sat with other couples considering the same things we were. we bought an read more books than I care to count and opened up parts of ourselves and our family that i didn't know existed.
As the weeks progressed and it became closer to the time when they would be inspecting our home and talking to family members, we made our family and friends aware of our plan.
The reaction was not what I expected. although, looking back I am not sure what I thought the reaction would be. the most prominent of all expressed thoughts was "Don't you think you have enough on your plate? why would you want to add more?" as though our lives was some kind of " all you can eat" buffet and we had overloaded it. we had never asked for the "Plate" we had gotten but neither did we regret it. this was our family. apparently, others saw it differently than we did. it truly surprised me that family members would be thinking that we were too stressed already, since very few of them tried to do anything to alleviate the stress. our lives and our parenting of Connor was always discussed as "no big deal" it was how Max had always wanted. (mind you it is also how he treats everything else)
I was not surprised that my Mother did not approve. after all, my mother had not approved of anything that I had done since I was sixteen. What did come as a shock, was that not one person, friend, family, co-worker, boss or doctor agreed with what we thought was a wonderful and beautiful idea. while some of the reactions were negative, but in a subtle fashion--my father's "oh really" for example--others were down right hurtful. One family member (in front of our sons) said "Why would you want another one?" as if Connor was some kind of mole, or bad piece art work that having one of was more than enough and conceiving of having another "one" was absolutely unthinkable.. It was at this point that I realised my biggest fear: not only would I be fighting society for acceptance of our son, but I would be fighting his own family. If Connor had been accepted and embraced as a functioning and important member of the family, then another child with special needs would just be that: another child. Yet, the opposite seemed to be true.
by the time we had come to this decision we had spent almost 14 years fighting everything from Doctors, therapists, schools and family to have our son receive the care and consideration that he needed. I knew that I did not have it in me to fight for him and then fight for another child.
We were the first couple that CAS called for a home study. they were so impressed by our record and by the fact that we WANTED to adopt a child with special needs that they had put us at the top of the list.
It was not meant to be. without the most basic of acceptance and understanding, I knew we could not do it. Although, most of the time, I felt like we had done everything alone with Connor, I never doubted that, some of the family and friends at least, cared about him and loved him. But, really what choice did they have ? he was related to them by birth. If we willingly brought a child into our family that we knowingly chose because they had disability, I did not believe that child would have been afforded the same apparent, luxury. I knew deep in my heart that while Connors flaws were tolerated, an adopted child may not be so lucky.
So, regrettably, we let go of the dream of a third addition to our family and most probably it was the right choice. As Connor entered high school, life became quite difficult. I lost my father, who had been one of Connors biggest supporters and suffered several health crisis. Connor required an extraordinary amount of help with school work. I believe if my focus had been divided between him and a younger child, one of us would have suffered, most probably me; and although it surprises me still, it is important that in the decisions of your life, you feel that at least SOME of the important people around you think it is a good idea.
Looking around at our very empty nest now, a small part of me regrets that we did not follow through, especially since Max wanted a girl! However, freedom is an excellent reward as well and Connor and Jarrett have more than made up for anything we may have missed in the parenting department.
If you have read other blogs of mine you will know that we never did overcome the acceptance thing and there are times when we are still invisible, and while my ovaries no longer scream at me, I still try to borrow other peoples kids at times when I am missing the parenting role. Most of the times the parents don't mind and I know that eventually I will have grandchildren to cuddle; and although we did not get to adopt "as many kids as I wanted to" Max has still come to regret those words. once again, my long and exact memory has bitten him in the butt and lets just say that he is grateful that Bradford has a 3 dog limit as a by-law, because what I haven't been able to adopt in kids, I have managed to rescue in dogs!
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